AstraZeneca to further accelerate new drug R&D in Japan

KazuhiroShimamura

TOKYO (MarketWatch) -- AstraZeneca Plc
AZN, -0.10%
aims to further accelerate efforts to bring its drugs to the Japanese market by investing more and expanding clinical studies, company executives said Friday.

AstraZeneca Chief Executive David Brennan said Japan, despite the low growth rate of its pharmaceutical market and biennial price cuts, is still an attractive place to do business for his company as well as other pharmaceutical makers that produce drugs not yet available here.

"Our expectations around growth for the Japanese market is based on our ability to bring new products to the market and receive the differential in pricing in reward for innovation that we believe our new products will represent," Brennan said in a news conference.

He declined to comment on the future of its partnership with Shionogi & Co. (4507.TO), which originally discovered the Crestor cholesterol-lowering drug AstraZeneca markets globally.

AstraZeneca's executive director for development John Patterson said the company, which started phase-1 clinical studies of 20 compounds in Japan this year, aims to bring another 20 compounds or so to the phase-1 stage in 2008.

It plans to double its research and development investment in Japan to around Y10 billion next year, he said.

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